


As It Should Be

by ruthc93



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Angst, Drunken sex, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Morally Questionable Choices, Not A Fix-It, Sad Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-21
Updated: 2016-09-21
Packaged: 2018-08-16 13:02:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8103283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruthc93/pseuds/ruthc93
Summary: Ray knows what Mick is going to do before the pyro even moves.Taking a step back swiftly, mindful of the failsafe still under his fingers, he aims his photon blaster at Mick the same instant Mick raises his gun.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So this was largely inspired by [an ask acoldatom got on Tumblr a while ago](http://acoldatom.tumblr.com/post/149501445840/this-has-probably-been-asked-or-done-before-but). I originally didn't plan to write anything for this, but an idea came to me in the middle of the night and I decided to give it a go.
> 
> A fair warning, there is no happy ending to this story. QwQ
> 
> **UPDATE 2017/04/23: added in one part with Kendra, and tweaked various things that don't really effect the plot.**

Ray knows what Mick is going to do before the pyro even moves.

Taking a step back swiftly, mindful of the failsafe still under his fingers, he aims his photon blaster at Mick the same instant Mick raises his gun.

For a tense second neither of them moves, the only sounds are Rip’s revolver going off in the background and distant shouting from frantic Time Masters.

Then Ray smiles. “It has to be me, Mick.”

Mick snarls, his heat gun still held over his head in the failed attempt to knock Ray out. “Like _hell_ it does, Haircut. Get _out_ of here and let _me_ do it. _I'm_ the one the Time Bastards tortured. _I'm_ the one who wants to see all of them _dead_.”

“No.”

“ _Haircut_!”

“ _No_.” The response is quick. Simple. No room for argument. A finality in the single word as Ray looks into Mick's eyes, a frightening amount of _resolve_ shining in them. “I won't let you die in my place, Mick.”

He’s not going to let _any_ of them die. In his place or not. He’s not going to sit back and do nothing when he could've saved their lives. Not again.

Rip is suddenly at their side. “We need to leave, _now_ ,” he says, a hint of panic in his tone.

“You should,” Ray agrees, arm still pointed at Mick, who looks furious and shows no sign of backing down.

“I'll be fine,” Ray smiles again, bright and peaceful, like he didn't just tell the biggest lie of all of time, like he wasn't about to _die_.

“ _Fuck_ you,” the pyro hisses.

“Mick,” Rip says, surprising all of them with the use of the name, guilt coating every word, “I'm sorry, but we have to go.”

“We're not leaving the Boy Scout to _die_.”

“I'm dead already,” Ray repeats. “Go with Rip, Mick. Go back to the team. They still need you.” There's a pause, as Ray opens his mouth then hesitates. Then he smiles again, this time with a sadness that neither of the other two are used to seeing on his face. “Snart still needs you.”

Mick's eyes widen, then he curses again before finally drawing back his gun and turning away, and Ray knows he had won this argument.

“Ray,” he hears Rip’s voice, still full of guilt, still full of regret, “I'm so sorry. I wish there was another way.”

He turns to the captain, and smiles, “It's okay, Rip. You know that this is the best possible outcome.”

Rip doesn't answer, but Ray knows that he's right.

* * *

“Where's Raymond?” Snart immediately asks the moment they step into view, drawing the attention of the rest of the team. Mick pointedly doesn't look at any of them.

Rip hesitates before answering. “Ray has…elected to stay.”

“ _Why_?” the demand comes out as a growl.

Rip explains, hurried and desperate, regret in his voice. Out of the corner of his eye Mick sees Snart’s eyes widen a fraction before looking the way they had come from. He can almost swear his long time partner's face has gone pale.

“Time to go, Snart.” He reaches out to grab hold of the man's arm, but Snart steps away at the last second, running back towards the Oculus with his face twisted in a snarl.

“Snart, wait!” Mick yells after him, but knows he's already too late. As he stands there, frustrated and fuming and unsure whether he should go after him and face Haircut _again_ , a shock of blonde hair darts past him and after Len.

“I'll bring them back, you guys get to the ship!” Sara shouts over her shoulder and is gone. And Mick can only swear in rage before turning around and setting the nearest Time Bastard on fire.

* * *

“ _Raymond_!”

The sound of his name snaps him out of the trance he's let himself fall into, repeating the action of aiming and firing photon blasts. Ray smiles. He'd know that voice anywhere.

“You should get out of here,” he states simply, not bothering to look at Len.

“Not without you, Raymond.” Len hisses at him as he shoots down another enemy, “What the _hell_ do you think you're going to accomplish this way? You can't be a hero if you're _dead_.”

“It has to be me,” Ray says, calm and quiet, repeating what he had told Mick. It's the only way. Why can't they see that?

Len is silent for a second, but Ray sees the movement before it reaches him and his one free hand flies up and catches the cold gun as it speeds toward his head.

He smiles at Len, whose eyes are narrowed in rage and seething back at him.

“Mick already tried that,” he tells him, letting go of the gun. “It's not going to work, Len. I'm not letting any one of you take my place.”

“I am not _leaving you here_ ,” Len all but shouts at him, leaning in close to his face, angry and desperate and _scared_ , and Ray can feel something, deep inside him, twist at this revelation, that Len obviously _cares_.

He smiles again, but the sadness that had tainted it once before is back, and without a warning, he closes what little distance is left between them and catches Len's lips with his own.

It's not their first kiss. They've done plenty of that, and more, before. But this one feels different, somehow, with Ray taking the lead and Len freezing at the initial contact before kissing back desperately, the hand that isn't closed around the cold gun coming up to run through his hair. It's sloppy and wet and _emotional_ and lasts all but three seconds before Ray pulls away, and Len lets out a growl.

“Don't.” Len grounds out through clenched teeth, eyes shut tight. “Don't make me _do_ this, Raymond.”

“I'm sorry,” he whispers back, ghosting his free hand up Len's arm to his shoulder, “please don't be mad at me.”

Then Ray plunges the needle he had snuck out of his pocket during the kiss into Len's neck.

Len reacts immediately, pushing himself away from Ray and placing one hand onto his neck, rubbing at the entry point as he stares at Ray with eyes wide in shock and betrayal. Ray only smiles back.

Just the fact that he was able to pull this off at all shows how out of it Len really is.

Len doesn't get the chance to say anything before his eyes roll back and his body falls limp.

Sara suddenly appears, catching the unconscious criminal before he can hit the floor, and looks up at Ray in disbelief.

“You drugged him.” It's not really an accusation, but there's a sliver of fear buried in those words.

“I had to,” Ray answers. He knows he should feel bad about this, and to an extent he does, but he doesn't regret it in the slightest. “Sara. Take him back. I'm not going with you.”

Sara stares at him, and Ray can see the conflict in her eyes. But finally she nods, adjusting her grip on Len, and looks back at Ray with a sad look.

“I'm sorry, Ray.”

Ray wishes they'd stop saying that.

“Don't be,” he replies, then he smiles at her, again, “Say hi to the folks back at home for me, yeah?”

* * *

The Time Masters are all around him, glaring and angry but none of them advancing.

“Shut it down!” the one he remembers is called Druce shouts at him. Ray’s smile grows into a grin, hand firmly keeping the failsafe in place, even as the light from the Oculus got brighter and more unbearable.

“Why? This is what you wanted, isn't it?” He asks, and then the whole world gets enveloped in white.

* * *

The first time Leonard wakes up doesn't end well for anybody.

He starts awake, shooting up from the MedBay futon. He sweeps his eyes around the room once before he's on his feet with a snarl, not caring about anything except _Raymond, Raymond is still back there, need to get back there-_

Jax tries to reason with him, tries to stop him from storming out and is rewarded with a broken arm as Leonard violently slams him against the wall and _twists_.

In the end both Sara and Mick are on him, holding him down as he fights against their iron grips, then Rip flashes that blasted light in his eyes, throwing him back into darkness.

* * *

The next time he wakes up, Leonard is in the brig.

He wakes up slower this time, the blinding light from Rip’s device only just fading. He blinks a few times, trying to get the stars out of his eyes, and finally sees the rest of the team beyond the transparent walls.

No one speaks for a few seconds, until Leonard quietly asks about Jax.

“I'm fine,” Jax mutters, “Gideon healed me up. Don't worry about it.”

Leonard lets out a sigh, “Sorry, kid.”

They let him out shortly after that. Leonard doesn't say anything, doesn't look at any of them as he walks out the doors and heads for his room.

* * *

They're standing around on the bridge like a bunch of fools, talking about Raymond and how his death is _heroic_ and that they'll never forget him.

Leonard feels _sick_.

* * *

Rip abandons them.

Sure, they're back home, in 2016, five months later, but it _feels_ like abandonment.

Jax leaves first, followed by Stein, and they merge before flying back towards Central, no doubt to check in with their own families.

Sara watches them fly away, and suddenly she takes in a sharp breath.

“I have to tell Oliver,” she says, strangled, “I have to tell _Felicity_.”

Leonard doesn't say anything, but briefly he entertains the idea of going with her. See with his own two eyes these people that Raymond had considered important.

He doesn't go.

* * *

Lisa hugs them when they arrive home.

“I _knew_ you're not dead!” she says, gleeful. “Mark owes me 200 now.”

Leonard tries to smile, tries to match her enthusiasm, but he can't do it, and Lisa catches on immediately.

“Lenny?” She pulls back, worry clear on her face, and when he doesn't answer she turns to Mick, “Mick? What happened?”

He hears Mick sigh, and a heavy hand falls on his shoulder. “We lost a friend.”

She won't buy it. Leonard knows that. She knows Leonard doesn't do _friends_. Lisa knows him.

Maybe a bit too well, because she gasps, turns back to him, studying his face, before pulling him into a hug again, this one full of comfort and love that he desperately needed but never would have admitted.

“Oh, _Lenny_.”

* * *

It takes two days for them to meet back where Rip had left them. It takes two hours before the Waverider shifts into view again.

They go after Savage. Leonard and Mick wait to ambush him in 1958 in silence, neither willing to talk about the obvious elephant in the metaphoric room.

Neither willing to talk about how they both tried to stop Raymond and failed.

Neither willing to talk about how they both would have taken Raymond's place.

Neither willing to talk about the gaping hole Raymond's absence left in their nonexistent hearts.

And neither says anything as they both train their weapons on Savage, burning and freezing his body over and over until it's nothing more than brittle ash crystals.

* * *

Apparently Raymond isn't - _wasn't_ \- the only idiot on the team.

“This isn't going to bring Ray back,” Sara says, her voice tight, a desperate plea in her words.

“I don't want to lose another friend,” Mick says quietly, an unusual _gentleness_ seeping through his voice.

Rip doesn't listen, and Leonard growls before deciding to speak.

“Get _back_ here, _Captain_ ,” he hisses into the comm link, “Raymond didn't give his _life_ for you to throw yours away.”

If the others noticed that this is the first time he's spoken about Raymond at all since waking up in the brig, they don't say anything.

* * *

Rip comes back.

Leonard is more relieved than he wants to be.

* * *

Kendra grabs Leonard's arm as they’re entering the bridge to leave 2021.

“What do you mean, Ray gave his life?” she demands, eyes wide and distressed, and he briefly wonders if that’s how he had looked when he first woke up in the MedBay.

He doesn’t answer, can’t bring himself to answer, and Kendra scowls before turning to the others, “Where’s Ray?”

None of them can meet her eyes.

"What _happened_? Where is he?”

Silence.

“Why won’t any of you _answer_  me?” she yells, desperation clear in her voice.

“He’s dead.” Mick finally says, dropping the words that Leonard has been dreading to hear. And Kendra takes a step back like she’s been slapped.

“Kendra, I’m so sorry,” Sara steps up, hands hovering in front of her, trying to be placating, but Kendra only backs further away.

“No,” she whispers, horrified, “no, that’s not…he can’t. He _can’t-_ ”

The last word turns into a choked off gasp. Carter comes up behind her, wrapping his arms around her, and Kendra spins wildly in his embrace and grabs tightly at his shirt. “Not him, not Ray, no, no, no, Ray, Ray, _Ray..._ ”

She breaks down with each word, until she’s nothing more than a shaking and sobbing mess against Carter’s chest. Carter holds her, as the rest of the team watches, and Leonard can’t help but feel a twinge of envy at her for being able to grieve in a way he never can.

* * *

 

Sara corners Leonard in one of the hallways on the ship and confesses being the one to drag him back from the Oculus.

Confesses being the one who essentially left Raymond behind.

“I'm so sorry, Leonard,” she says, not quite looking at him, guilt and shame weighing heavily on her shoulders.

Leonard wants to be angry at her. Wants to blame her for what happened, wants to channel this piling rage and grief in him at something, _anything_ , that could serve as a target, but he knows it won't be fair to her.

It's not what Raymond would've wanted.

“Don't,” he says simply, “The only one to blame is Raymond’s _stupid_ white knight ideology.”

It's more than that, and they both know it. But Sara doesn't correct him as he walks away, and Leonard isn't sure if he's grateful for that or not.

* * *

This is a bad idea. This is _cheating_. But life has already screwed with him in more ways than he can be bothered to count and Leonard is honestly past the point of caring now.

He remembers Raymond telling him about the one night, maybe a bit too well. The one night not that long after Anna’s death, where he drove mindlessly to a small town away from Starling City, checked into a small hotel, and tried to drown himself with alcohol at the local bar.

It's almost embarrassingly easy to find where the small town is once he provides Gideon with all the information he has.

He sees him, hunched over at the bar with what has to be his sixth glass in his hand, crying and quiet and _alive_ and Leonard can feel the deep ache in the pits of his stomach _tear_ through the rest of him.

Against his better judgement he sits down next to him, orders the same thing he's drinking and asks to join him.

Raymond laughs, tipsy and giddy, and tells him he's not exactly the best company right now because he's just lost his fiancee.

Leonard should feel some sort of remorse when he answers, when he _lies_ , that so did he, but he doesn't.

It's not really a lie, anyway.

* * *

He's not nearly drunk enough when he follows Raymond back to his hotel room, certainly not enough to completely blame the alcohol when he slams the other man against the nearest wall, mouth and hands all over him as soon as the door clicks shut behind them.

Leonard hates it. He hates the disturbing amount of alcohol he can taste in Raymond’s mouth. He hates the way Raymond surrenders himself completely under his touch, kissing back and clawing at him in what he knows is a desperate need to forget. He hates the way this younger and less scarred body beneath him still reacts the same way he remembers. He hates the fact that he knows Raymond’s body like the city plan of his home. He hates every moan he manages to pull from Raymond’s lips.

He hates himself with every thrust, every cry that escapes Raymond’s throat, and every quiet whimper of _Anna_ that reminds him he's taking advantage of a broken, grieving, completely wasted man.

After they're done, they both lie in the bed, completely exhausted. For Leonard, mentally much more than physically.

Suddenly Raymond turns to him, eyelids heavy with sleep, but not enough to hide away the wonder in his brown eyes.

“You know me,” he whispers, and Leonard feels a twist in his stomach at the certainty, the _clarity_ , behind the words. Fuck, isn't he supposed to be _drunk_? “Who are you?”

He thinks about where he, the _current_ he, should be now, miles away in another city, planning another heist that isn't going to get foiled by the Flash, because the world hasn't gone mad, not yet.

“Nobody important,” he whispers back, pulling him close and planting a kiss between Raymond’s eyes, and lets him fall asleep in his arms.

* * *

Leonard doesn't sleep. He waits until he's sure Raymond is completely out before pushing himself out of bed, away from the other man, and hates the way his body aches for the warmth he's leaving behind.

He gets dressed. Prepares a glass of water, a note that simply says “Drink Me”, and some pills for the hangover he knows Raymond will suffer when he wakes up.

Then Leonard dissolves another pill, one of many that he stole from the stash back when they dealt with the Pilgrim, into the water.

This Raymond, still young, still grieving, is better off not remembering what had happened last night.

After everything is done, he sits down on the edge of the bed.

And in that moment, in the dead of the night, with no one around to see or hear him but the man sleeping soundly in front of him, Leonard allows himself to break.

His hands shake as he traces his fingers over Raymond’s face, as he runs his hand through the impossibly soft hair and he lets out a strangled sob.

But the moment passes, and that's all he allows himself. Taking a deep breath, he stares at the face he's never going to see again, searing it into his memories as he leans down, placing one final kiss on his forehead.

“Goodbye, Raymond.”

The words he never got to say to him, to _his_ Ray, echo throughout the room despite being a hushed whisper.

He leaves, never looking back, and avoids everyone else’s eyes when he gets back to the Waverider.

**_The End_ **

* * *

  **_Bonus_ **

This is a trick. Some cruel joke that fate decided to play. Another slap in the face by whoever the hell is in charge of his life story and Leonard wants to demand a refund.

But there, behind Thawne, stepping out of Merlyn's shadow, is the man who has haunted his dreams since that night in 2014, the man who he hasn't been able to move on from.

The man who's supposed to be _dead_.

“Hi,” he says cheerfully, the familiar bright smile twisted with something _foul_ as he raises his arm and calmly aims the photon blaster at them. At the team. At _Leonard_.

“I'm Ray.”

**_The End?_ **

**Author's Note:**

> You can blame the bonus on everything we know so far of Legends' season two. :'D
> 
> I am most likely not going to continue this. If I _were_ to continue this, it would very much depend on how season two plays out, because at this point I've made this story into sort of a companion piece to the show itself. I tried very hard not to stray too far from canon, as you can probably tell. So I would like it to stay that way.
> 
> That said, if I actually get an idea of how to continue this without relying on the show, I'll probably try to write it. But that depends on if I have time with all the others things I have planned, not just the future chapters of Dissonance but also for the upcoming ColdAtom Fall Week. ^q^
> 
> We'll see, is the answer, I guess!


End file.
